


chicken salad

by duckiesandlemons



Category: Kamen Rider - All Media Types, Kamen Rider Gaim
Genre: Awkward Romance, Friends to Lovers, Healing, M/M, Post-Canon, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Unhealthy Coping Mechanisms
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-07-30
Updated: 2019-07-30
Packaged: 2020-07-26 02:37:36
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 1,706
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20036518
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/duckiesandlemons/pseuds/duckiesandlemons
Summary: This grief, this guilt, this pain—it’s hard to deal with.It will continue to be hard.The awkward romance of two people recovering from the trauma of ghosts that still haunt them.





	1. Prologue

**Author's Note:**

> I was like...just hit with a lot of Gaim feelings   
Specifically of my favorite boy Zack and my favorite controversial boy Micchi

“I want to not be here, sometimes,” Mitsuzane—Micchi—tells Zack. “I wish I didn’t stay.”

And Zack almost agrees. He wishes Kaito didn’t disappear, that Kouta and Mai stayed on Earth, stayed in Zawame—he wishes so much. But Zack cannot go back in time. He cannot stop people from making the choices they made. Instead he just stays quiet, eyes pointed skyward. Micchi remains quiet as well, his knees tucked close to his chest.

“…I want them back,” Micchi finally says, after seconds have stretched into minutes.

Zack nods, “Me too.”

Micchi leans over, head softly thunking against Zack’s shoulder. Zack can feel the subtle shaking, the slight trembles. Grief, building up and up and with no outlet, finally pouring out when Micchi feels safe enough to let it all go. Micchi still blames himself and Zack—

Zack wants to blame him. He wants to blame Micchi for everything that’s happened, but he can’t. He absolutely can’t because if he thinks on it long enough he can almost understand. Love makes people do horrible things. Love makes people blind, and from what Zack knows about Micchi “love” had been something he was always trying to reach out for.

Hesitantly, Zack puts an arm around Micchi. Micchi doesn’t even flinch or pull away. He takes it as permission turning in Zack’s grip to bury his face in Zack’s shoulder. Like this the tremors are more pronounced. Like this, Zack can feel more than hear the aborted whines and choked sobs, the noises muffled by his coat. Micchi is trying so hard to keep it all in. 

Zack doesn’t understand why.

He doesn’t understand, so he just holds Micchi closer to try and soften the pain.

This grief, this guilt, this pain—it’s hard to deal with.

It will continue to be hard.

Zack wants to tell Micchi that, but he doesn’t. The other needs time to mourn. Just like Zack needs time to believe it himself—believe that things will be hard, that time will eventually heal every ache and scar on his being. 

Time passes by for them like this—Micchi’s face buried in Zack’s shoulder crying and crying until there’s no more tears and his sobs have long since faded into tired rasps of breath. 

“Feel better?” Zack asks, his eyes still staring up at the now evening sun painted sky. He follows the pastel pinks, the soft yellows, blending into oranges and reds until spilling into the brilliant dark blue of the oncoming night. He wants Micchi to look up at it, too, but he doesn’t force him.

“Yeah,” Micchi’s voice is hoarse.

Zack doesn’t say anything else. He just gives Micchi a soft squeeze. A sign that it’s okay, that Zack doesn’t blame him for crying, that he understands. At least, he’s trying to understand. Eventually, Micchi pulls away and gets up, grabs his hat off the ground and places it back on his head.

“I have to head home.”

“Ok.”

“Why do you stay with me?”

“I don’t know.”

“…thank you.”

Zack just watches as Micchi bows, polite as always, before turning to leave. He watches his back, remembers when he wore his Gaim hoodie, remembers when he wore a suit far too big, remembers when he tried to be an adult. And isn’t that where the issue began, Zack thinks. For all of them, for every single one of them, trying so hard to carry a burden they felt no one else could handle.

“Man,” he sighs, “growing up sucks, huh, Kaito?”

Of course, the air does not answer back.

Zack spends a few more minutes like this before getting up himself so he can head back home. 


	2. but somehow it doesn't feel real

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> he's so tired of feeling like this

His fist makes a solid sound, one that echoes, and it sends a thrill through Zack’s body. Again and again, he swings his fists, lashes out and lands blows, twists and turns and keeps his guard up. He had told himself never again—not unless he had to. That world he left behind, but now he comes crawling back lapping it up like a dog deprived of water. They laugh at him, they sneer, because isn’t he one of those riders? One of Zawame’s saviors? We beat you up once and you come back? Think you can beat us?

Zack remembers.

He also remembers he’s not weak anymore. He’s been forged under fire, has been saved and taught to dance and has felt joy that he can’t possibly explain.

So he throws the first punch again.

They go down.

They always go down now.

Zack wipes at the corner of his mouth, sees blood and clicks his tongue. What would his old team say, seeing their leader pick fights like some common thug? What would Peco say, seeing Zack throw himself back down dangerous habits? He doesn’t know anymore.

He doesn’t know.

And there is the problem, Zack thinks, as he stumbles out of that alleyway he chased them to and out into the open streets of Zawame. He doesn’t know what to do with this pain that still haunts him. He is haunted in his sleep, in his every day life, where even the subtlest of sounds can sometimes have him flinching. He remembers pain, wakes up screaming, tries to put pieces together and forgive people.

(“Why did you forgive me?” Micchi had asked. “Why?”)

Zack’s phone goes off, Peco’s name bright on his screen. Zack thinks about picking it up, thinks about what he’s done, and with a guilty hand declines the call. Peco will be mad at him again. Peco is almost always mad at him nowadays. He tries to hide it, tries to treat Zack as he always does, because Peco knows that what Zack is going through isn’t—

Normal?

He’s not sure.

He’s never sure.

Zack’s phone goes off again. This time it’s Micchi whose name appears. Zack thinks of declining this one, too, but then he thinks.

He thinks and picks it up.

“_Hello?_” Micchi’s voice sounds distant, barely heard over the roar of Zawame. Barely heard with the hissing of summer, blamy heat turning Zack’s skin sticky with sweat and kissing at bruises that still yell at him.

“Yeah, what’s up?” he asks.

“…Peco-san asked me to call you—”

“_Call me Peco--!_”

“—because you didn’t pick up.”

Zack almost laughs, because of course.

Of course.

“Yeah…sorry about that I accidentally hit decline,” the lie comes out too easily and Zack starts making his way to where he knows Peco would drag Micchi. Drupers is, after all, their usual spot. It’s where everyone used to gather, used to laugh—the loneliness stings.

It stings and Zack wants to run away.

(It’s bad today, he belatedly realizes. It has never been this bad)

“_Are you…okay?_” Micchi still sounds unsure as he asks this question. As if he’s not quite sure where he and Zack stand. Zack gets that. Their relationship isn’t even understood by others. Two wounded people propping themselves up, helping each other through a period of adjustment. Sure, Zack could call them that. He also wants to call them friends, because Micchi understands.

Zack understands.

“Fine as can be,” another lie. He’s not okay today, not when he vents with his fighting instead of his dancing. “Something up?”

“_Yeah, something’s up and it’s called you ignoring my call!_” Peco’s voice echoes through this time. Zack spends the next few minutes in playful banter with Peco. Back and forth, back and forth, a tennis match that Zack knows by heart and embraces the familiar rhythm of. When he reaches Druper’s he hangs up and takes a deep breath.

One.

Two.

Three.

He opens the door and is greeted by a smile, a wave, by—Micchi looks at him as if he is someone different and yet familiar all at once. Zack wonders if a bruise is on his face, but it’s Peco who points it out. “Did you get into a fight—you have a cut on your lip…Zack…” his voice trails off into worry.

“I fell,” a lie.

He keeps on lying.

It tastes disgusting. Micchi keeps staring at him, Peco keeps talking, and Zack grins and bears it. They’re his friends, he loves being around them, he bears it, he bears it—

_Kaito defeats him. Almost kills him. His friend almost kills him._

\--he bears it and sits down with them at the table they had chosen. If he feels the slight nudge of Micchi’s foot against his under the table he doesn’t react. He says nothing, joining in with their laughter and talk until Peco eventually has to leave.

“Is it hard?” Micchi asks quietly.

“No,” Zack says. Micchi stares at him with pondering eyes, prying him apart piece by piece, seeing through it all. Zack swallows, emotions thick in his throat, pain held close to his breast, “Yes.” Slowly, Micchi gets up, leaving enough to cover the both of them. He stands in front of Zack and waits.

Waits for him to get up with legs that still hurt.

Waits for him to get himself together while his mind is muddled.

Waits for Zack to take one agonizing step at a time until they’re outside of Druper’s and into the hot air of Zawame. The heat is starting to remind Zack of the heat of his bomb, of Kaito’s attacks as he tossed Zack aside like a rag doll.

It’s so bad today.

Micchi’s hand is cool against his, coaxing him to keep walking until they reach their usual place. Stairs shaded by a partition covered in plants, the other side a cliff guarded by a railing that looks out over the ocean. They sit as they always do, Zack sprawled out along the steps and Micchi sitting on one with his knees pulled to his chest.

“Sometimes,” Zack starts, “I can remember how it felt. I dream, I react, I fight. To forget, I fight more, because it feels like that’s all I know.”

“But you can dance,” Micchi tells him.

“I can dance,” Zack says, “but dancing is hard when your body can only remember doing nothing but fighting.”

The cicadas cry, filling the summer air with their noise.

Micchi stays quiet.

Zack wants to cry.


End file.
